Page 39 of The King of Koraha
“The bazaar,” she said.
“What about it?” Rendor asked.
“If there’s anyone who is using magic to steal, that’s where they’d be.”
“If they stole the taxes, they wouldn’t need to hang around the market stands anymore,” Najib said. “Wouldn’t they be long gone?”
“Yes, but there might be others. And if we can talk to one of those others…”
“They might tell us who stole the taxes,” Rendor finished. “It’s a very long shot.”
“I know. But do we have any other options?”
Rendor considered. “We could interview the Nintri monks. Ask if they ran into trouble while collecting the taxes.”
While Nintri was on her list of places to visit, she wasn’t ready to leave Qulsary just yet. “How about we try my idea for a couple sun jumps first?”
“All right.”
They spent the rest of darkness in one of the castle’s guest suites. The cushion was so comfortable Shyla didn’t want to leave. She burrowed deep under the fur, ignoring Hakana’s insistent knocking at angle twenty and letting Rendor answer the door.
But he returned far too soon and yanked the fur off of her. “Rise and shine, sunbeam.” His tone was way too chipper.
She threw a pillow at him, but she might as well have blown him a kiss—the result was the same. After getting out of the cushion, which took more effort than she’d like to admit, Shyla changed and joined Rendor and Hakana in the sitting room.
“Why do you want to go to the main bazaar?” Hakana asked when they informed her of their destination.
“Why are you asking?” Rendor countered.
“If you wish to shop, there are many other smaller bazaars that have better quality goods for reasonable prices. The sellers in the main bazaar will charge you twice what an item’s worth. And you have to be careful that they don’t sell you a fake.”
That last word slammed into her, causing her mind to whirl with possibilities. “A fake? What do you mean by that?”
Hakana shrugged. “Things like selling you a sun cloak that’s not made of velbloud fibers but some cheap imitation. You pay four times the price for it, then when you wear it topside, you fry in the sun.”
Shyla pulled together the little clues she’d picked up on without really knowing she was collecting them. Fakes. Could the coins be fakes? Not made with osmium but a cheap metal or stone painted a shiny silver-blue color to resemble an osee to fool the guards and monks.
But Yiesha’splink, plink, plinkmeant the fakes would still be in the pool, where they would have been discovered when the King lifted the water. Unless—
“That’s it!” she exclaimed.
“What’s it?” Rendor asked. He and Hakana stared at her.
“Salt,” she said.
“What about it?”
“The water in the vault was salty.”
“And that means?”
“The coins were fakes. They may have looked like osees and plinked in the water, but they were made of salt. They dissolved in the water!”
Six
Hakana stared at her as if she’d lost her mind, but Rendor’s expression was more contemplative.
“The use of fake coins solves a few mysteries, but Advisor Yiesha would have noticed the coins were fake,” Rendor said.
